Dive Brief:
- Nvidia is investing $2 billion in chip design software maker Synopsys as part of an expanded partnership to improve product design and engineering in the age of physical artificial intelligence. The technology firm said it purchased Synopsys’ stock at $414.79 per share.
- As AI becomes more complex and challenging to develop, the companies have agreed to leverage each other's strengths — Nvidia’s accelerated computing and Synopsys’ engineering solutions — to help research teams design, simulate and verify intelligent products more efficiently.
- Synopsys will pivot to using Nvidia’s CUDA-X and AI physics technologies across its applications, as well as Omniverse digital twins, to achieve simulation speed and scale “previously unattainable” through central processing unit computing, according to a news release.
Dive Insight:
Founder and CEO Jensen Huang said on an investor call Monday that Nvidia’s accelerated computing technologies powered by graphics processing units have reached a maturity and capability that allows for product and system design completely inside the computer “at a scale never before possible.”
“We’re seeing speed up from 10x to over 1,000x,” he said. “Basically, what this means is something that would take weeks could now happen in hours.”
Over the past decade, there has been a shift in how scientific computing is done. In 2016, the general technology mix for a supercomputing data center was 90% CPU to 10% GPU, Huang said. Today, the “entire mix has flipped,” he said, adding that he expects the same shift to happen for design and engineering.
As part of the multiyear collaboration, Nvidia and Synopys also plan to enable cloud access for GPU-powered engineering solutions and develop go-to-market strategies to reach multiple industries.
“Together, we will address nearly every industry where scientists are inventing new technologies, engineers are creating new products and factories that make them,” Huang said.
In July, Synopsys acquired Ansys for $35 billion, expanding its simulation and multi-physics technology. The acquisition also expanded the company’s customer reach to industries spanning semiconductors, high-tech, automotive, aerospace, industrial and more.
That global network of thousands of direct sellers and channel partners combined with Nvidia’s expanded partnership creates a “significant” opportunity to transform and accelerate workflows, Synopsys President and CEO Sassine Ghazi said on the investor call.
The partnership is not exclusive, meaning that the companies can still work with other companies in the ecosystem.
In recent years, manufacturers have integrated AI across their operations, including for product design, the shop floor and supply chain management, according to an October report from the National Association of Manufacturers.
Companies like Belden, Lucid Motors, Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co., Caterpillar and Foxconn are already using Nvidia’s Omniverse technologies for a range of applications, including to design, simulate and upgrade their facilities, as well as connect to their robotics.
